Sean Combs Must Stay in Jail Until Trial After Judge Rejects Appeal

A federal judge on Wednesday ordered Sean Combs to remain in jail until his trial for sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy, rejecting an appeal by the music mogul’s lawyers requesting that he be released on bail.

Judge Andrew L. Carter Jr. said at a hearing in Lower Manhattan that Mr. Combs posed a risk of witness tampering and was a danger to the safety of the community. He rejected an unusual proposal from Mr. Combs’s legal team in which he would have remained at his mansion in Florida, monitored around the clock by a private security force. The lawyers had offered a $50 million bond for his release.

Arguing that Mr. Combs was prone to violence, prosecutors spoke at length about a leaked surveillance video from 2016 in which he was seen physically assaulting Casandra Ventura, his former girlfriend, who is known as Cassie. She filed a sexual assault lawsuit against him last year that was quickly settled.

The judge said “that video is quite disturbing,” after which Mr. Combs, seated between his lawyers, nodded several times.

Marc Agnifilo, one of Mr. Combs’s lawyers, said his client should not be detained based on an assault from eight years ago that led him to go to rehab. “Mr. Combs has the unfortunate reality that the worst thing he ever did is on videotape,” the lawyer said.

The government’s concern that Mr. Combs might intimidate witnesses was a theme of the hearing.

“His influence makes it so difficult for witnesses to share their experiences and trust that the government can keep them safe from him,” said Emily A. Johnson, one of the prosecutors.